Two best friends in Omaha to compete on ‘Wheel of Fortune’ this week

Omahans Angela Eglseder, 33, and Jenyl Hankenson, 32, have been best friends since their days at Morton Middle School, and they’ve been “Wheel of Fortune” devotees for about as long. Wednesday night, they’ll test both the bonds of their friendship and strength of their word puzzle-solving skills on America’s most circular game show. Eglseder and Hankenson will compete together on “Wheel of Fortune” at 6:30 p.m. on KETV. This week is Best Friends Week on the show, inviting pairs of besties from all over the country to face off against each other. The friends filmed the episode in March after doing local tryouts in February. For more than a month, they’ve had to apologetically tell friends and family they’ve been sworn to secrecy regarding the outcome of the show. They can’t say if they won or lost or tripped while walking onto the stage. “I’m very excited for it to finally air so people can stop asking what happened,” said Eglseder, a palliative care nurse with CHI. Only their closest family members know how they fared. But soon enough everyone will know. They’re holding a viewing party at a bar Wednesday night for friends, family and coworkers. For now, they can only speak generally about the experience. “It all happened really fast,” Eglseder said. “It was fun. It was exciting. It was nerve-racking. It was full of emotions.” They only got to interact with host Pat Sajak on the show itself. But they got to meet co-host Vanna White backstage…. [Read full story]